Emma Stone Shouts Apology for Whitewashed Role in ‘Aloha’ During Golden Globes

It is one of the most notorious examples of casting a white actor in a role intended for a person of color. In Cameron Crowe’s Aloha, Emma Stone plays Allison Ng, a woman who is supposedly one-quarter Chinese and one-quarter Hawaiian. As is quite obvious from Stone’s appearance, she is neither of those things. Aloha wasn’t very good with or without Stone’s casting but that certainly didn’t help, and it has remained a particularly egregious recent example of Hollywood whitewashing.

So when the film came up tonight during Andy Samberg and Sandra Oh’s Golden Globes monologue — with Emma Stone in attendance (she was nominated for The Favourite, but lost to Regina King) — you may have heard someone yell “I’m sorry!!” from off camera. That was Emma Stone. Take a look:

If you’re curious, here was Crowe’s response to the controversy back in 2015:

I have heard your words and your disappointment, and I offer you a heart-felt apology to all who felt this was an odd or misguided casting choice. As far back as 2007, Captain Allison Ng was written to be a super-proud one quarter Hawaiian who was frustrated that, by all outward appearances, she looked nothing like one. A half-Chinese father was meant to show the surprising mix of cultures often prevalent in Hawaii. Extremely proud of her unlikely heritage, she feels personally compelled to over-explain every chance she gets. The character was based on a real-life, red-headed local who did just that.